Illness/Sickness: Weird behaviour with spinning

Hi all!

Since a couple of days, my axolotl is acting very odd.

He looks like he can't balance and sometimes he spins very fast, like he wants to bite his tail or leg. When he stops he doesn't move anymore (like he's dead).

I don't see any external problems ( no fungus or external wounds).

He stopped eating a week ago, but since christmas his eating behaviour is irregular.
He doesn't eat for weeks and eats a lot for weeks and so on.
After he didn't eat for 3 weeks, I went to the vet. He didn't see a problem and advised me to give other foodtypes.

I give him earthworms, sometimes waxworms and there are a couple of guppies in his tank (advise from the vet as alternative food source).

I just tested his water: 0 NH4/NH3, 0 NO2 and a bit of NO3.
But every sunday is water changing day and this was before the change so NO3 will be lower.

The aquarium is cycled ( bought the axolotl in october). It's 60cm (24 inch?) with internal filter from sera. I'm planning on getting a bigger one with external filter, since he grew so much in so little time and I'm having a bit of a struggle with the temperature.

The temperature is a bit high = 21,5 °C, but I'm trying to lower it with some ventilators.
The temperatur has always been a bit on the high side ( because of internal filter? even when roomtemperature is lower)

I hope it's nothing serious, but his behaviour freaks me out
Last night I saw him walking around and suddenly he stops and rolls on his back like he is dead. A couple of seconds later he goes back on his belly.
I know they show some weird behaviour, but that freaked me out.

Thanks for the help!
I can add more pictures if needed.

This certainly does sound weird... from what I can see his cloaca looks quite swollen... but not sure if that would explain his behaviour

I bought him in October and his cloaca has the same size as it had back then.
When I took him to the vet, he didn't payed attention to it and just told his assistent that it was a sign of a male.

The spinning is usually a sign of a neurological infection.

Sorry my bad, I own a female so looks a little odd to me but if the vet says its alright then trust him

No problem Thanks for the reaction anyway :happy:

Neurological infection sounds bad. What can be the cause of that? Parasites?

Axel has calmed down, but he's hiding in his cave the entire day.

How is he now? Has he improved? I'm just worried cos I had an axie with balance problems and I think neurological infection. By the time I took her to the vet, it was quite bad, and the vet gave me antibiotic injections, which I had to inject her with every day. If he is still losing his balance and doing spinning, please ask the vet to do some tests for bacteria. Good luck. Let us know what happens.

Well, The last weeks he was acting extremely inactive and wasn't eating.
I only saw him 3 times out of his cave and he showed some imbalancing issues, but it wasn't extremely spinning like before. He spinned only once, when I was trying to feed him.

Another issue that started to bother me: he placed his tail always near his head, like an U-shape.

Couple of days ago, I lowered the temperature to 18-18.5 °C with a fan and yesterday he showed more active behaviour and started eating again (very well: he ate 3 earthworms).

Since I lowered the temperature, he looks a lot better. Only the U-shape still bothers me, but it's starting to go away ( I think).

He seems to be going downhill since a couple of houres ago .

I'm really getting worried, I filmed his behaviour and I'm going to the vet tommorow I think.

I uploaded it on youtube:
YouTube - ‪Axolotl ‬‏

The last weeks he looked so much better, but this doesn't look good or is it me?

I noticed that he shows this behaviour every time I feed tubifex to the guppies, but that's a coincidence?

He's now calmed down and hiding in his cave, but I better go to the vet ASAP?

I went to the vet monday morning and he kept the axolotl with him.
Everyday he gets an injection of antibiotic.

I called him today to see, if he has improved.
He doesn't seem to improve and the vet has also given him a painkiller.
It's not looking very good and the vet isn't very optismistic (like he was monday morning).

He's gonna stay there for the next days, and Friday night the vet has an meeting with a lot of ectothermic experts.

He's gonna take the axolotl with him and see what they will say.

Best of luck. I hope it all turns out okay.

I'm glad you have taken your axie to the vet. The video reminds me so much of the axie I used to have, very similar behaviour.It was am infection in her nervous system. I also had to inject her with antibiotics every day. It took a very long time for her to improve, more than a month. And even when she got better she walked slightly lopsided. Prior to that she had fungus and cloudy eye, but am not sure if that is connected.

I wish your axie quick recovery. Please keep us posted.Good luck.

I just called with the vet: he's still not responding to the antibiotics (after 7 days of treatment).
He's still showing severe balancing issues and he's sometimes floating.

He's gonna try a last type of antibiotics, hopefully this one workes, but it doesn't looks good.

If he doesn't show improvement by thursday, he's gonna euthanise him .

I'm so sorry to hear this, especially since you've had him less than a year... but if it is a neurological thing, then it wasn't that you were doing anything wrong. I have my fingers crossed that this new type of antibiotics works.

Sending my very best wishes to you + Axel
I have also got to say though, that your vet seems to be doing a wonderful job - willing to look at an animal s/he isn't an expert on, but then supplimenting their knowledge with advise from others + continuing to try, rather than opting for euthanasia when it looked tricky. Hopefully the efforts of you both will pay off :happy:

memojo1979 said:

Sending my very best wishes to you + Axel
I have also got to say though, that your vet seems to be doing a wonderful job - willing to look at an animal s/he isn't an expert on, but then supplimenting their knowledge with advise from others + continuing to try, rather than opting for euthanasia when it looked tricky. Hopefully the efforts of you both will pay off :happy:

Click to expand...

Thank you!
The vets is doing a fantastic job, he's specialized in cold-blooded organismes and treates this types of animals in the zoo and sea-life.

But it seems that he never treated this type of illness in axolotl.
He's trying to learn from it and hopefully Axel can recover by his efforts.

Im so sorry to hear all this is happening to your poor axie. But I have to agree with everyone on the fact that it seems you have a lovely vet there helping you! I hope the vet manages to help Axel. Fingers crossed for you and Axel. :happy:

Axel didn't respond to the antibiotics and showed no improvemant.
So Axel passed away gently at the side of his trusty vet.
He's going to perform an autopsy to see if he can learn something from it.

So sorry for your loss I hope he finds out what it was!

Very sorry to hear this. Axel had the cutest little face.